Digitising the Prosopography of the Roman Republic

罗马共和国(公元前509年至公元前31年)的历史是由竞争激烈的贵族精英塑造的，他们监督了罗马从中等意大利城邦到地中海帝国统治者的非凡转变。这个项目试图通过对这一精英阶层的个人进行传记研究，包括其家庭组成、任职模式、内部等级以及财产和财富，来加深我们对这一精英阶层的结构和动态的了解。这些问题的重要性早已被认识到，许多关于罗马精英人物传记的基本信息已经在学术著作中进行了整理。然而，由于材料的规模和复杂性(布劳顿的指数列出了3299个人)，以前对其进行综合分析是不可行的，这些因素包括个人的职业模式、家庭连续性、跨家族联系，以及与担任公职的群体以外的精英家庭的联系。现在，数字技术借鉴了KCL数字人文部在这一领域的经验、才华和成功，使我们能够创建一个开放访问、可搜索的数字数据库，其中包括所有已知的共和党精英成员，这将为重新讨论旧问题以及提出从未考虑过可行性的全新问题开辟全新的机会。为了加快我们的工作，我们获得了DDH的许可和技术专长，可以通过在Broughton半自动输入数据来建立我们的数据库，然后根据需要进行检查、更新和扩展。这个项目有两个重要的新奇之处。首先，将更全面的方法应用于罗马精英阶层。尽管担任政治职务的“贵族”自然吸引了最多的学术关注，但我们不可能理解精英阶层不断变化的性质和运作方式，而不是不仅考虑参议院的较低级别，而且还考虑到富有的非参议员，他们在共和国的上个世纪成为马术秩序，以及日益壮大的意大利市政精英。这些群体在社会上紧密结合在一起，该项目首次试图系统地绘制出将他们联系在一起的血缘、婚姻、出身、商业或友谊的联系以及他们之间发生的流动。第二，与以前大多数关于罗马共和国的传记作品不同，该项目将在对统治集团进行社会学研究的更广泛背景下找到其研究结果，并设想将其与威尼斯共和国进行直接比较，因为它与威尼斯共和国有共同的基本特征。这个数据库将使我们能够审查的新老问题包括：家长制的组成、作用和数量下降；地位，而不仅仅是担任公职，在多大程度上是世袭的；某些家族群体在某些时期明显占据统治地位的阶段的原因，反过来，一些家族在某些时期消失；精英阶层中财富的分配和水平和性质的变化；家庭传统和历史对罗马编年史传统的影响。然而，具有特殊历史影响的问题将是社会战争后当地意大利精英融入罗马精英的程度、地点和速度。尽管意大利出生的领事直到奥古斯都时代才出现，但我们要说的是，进入参议院下层的速度更快，许多以前对传统的共和制度没有投资的新家族对政治制度的渗透在破坏传统共和制度的稳定中发挥了重要作用。因此，我们的人口学研究将为共和国的垮台和校长的建立提供一个至关重要的新视角。

The history of the Roman Republic (c. 509 to 31 BCE) was shaped by a highly competitive aristocratic elite, which oversaw Rome's remarkable transformation from middling Italian city-state to ruler of a Mediterranean empire. This project seeks to enhance our understanding of the structure and dynamics of this elite through prosopographical study of its attested individuals, including its familial composition, office-holding patterns, internal hierarchies and property and wealth. The importance of these questions has long been recognised and much basic information for the prosopography of the Roman elite has already been collated in scholarly works. However, because of the sheer scale and complexity of the material (Broughton's index lists 3,299 individuals), it has not previously been practicable to subject it to a comprehensive analysis that integrates multiple factors such as individual 'career' patterns, family continuity, cross-familial links, and connections with elite families outside the office-holding group. Now digital technology, drawing on the experience, flair and success in this area of the Department of Digital Humanities at KCL, enables us to create an open-access searchable digital database comprising all known members of the republican elite, which will open up radically new opportunities for revisiting old questions as well as asking entirely new ones that have not been considered on grounds of feasibility. To speed our work, we have permission, and the technical expertise from DDH, to build our database through a semi-automated inputting of the data in Broughton, which will then be checked, updated and expanded as required. There are two significant novelties to this project. First, the application of a more holistic approach to the Roman elite. Whereas the 'nobility', that is the holders of political office, have naturally attracted most scholarly attention, it is impossible to understand the constantly shifting nature and workings of the elite without taking into account not only the lower ranks of the senate but also the wealthy non-senators who, in the last century of the Republic, became the equestrian order, and the growing municipal elite of Italy. These groups were closely integrated socially, and for the first time the project seeks to map systematically the links of blood, marriage, origin, business or friendship, that bound them together and the movements that happened between them. Second, in contrast to most previous prosopographical work on the Roman Republic, the project will locate its findings in the wider context of sociological studies of ruling groups, and a direct comparison is envisaged with the Venetian republic with which it shared essential characteristics. The old and new issues which this database will enable us to examine include the composition, role and numerical decline of the patriciate; the extent to which status, rather than just office-holding, was hereditary; the reasons for phases of apparent dominance by particular family groups and, conversely, the disappearance of some families in some periods; the distribution and changing levels and nature of wealth among the elite; the influence on the Roman annalistic tradition of family traditions and histories. The issue with special historical impact, however, will be the extent, location and speed of integration of the local Italian elites into the elite of Rome after the Social War. Although Italian-born consuls did not appear until Augustan times, we will argue that entry to the lower senatorial levels was more rapid, and the infiltration of the political system by so many new families who had previously had no investment in the traditional republican system played a major role in destabilising that system. Our prosopographical study will thus provide a vital new perspective on the fall of the Republic and the establishment of the Principate.